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Starbucks, you may need espresso training, but you wound me in other ways

If you didn’t see the signs on each and every Starbucks in the nation, let Starbucks Gossip and the Seattle Times fill you in on why all stores are closing Tuesday night for espresso training.

But I have a more pressing matter. I’m not allowed to use the seven dirty words, but I will say that Starbucks — this morning anyway — is #$#@-ed — totally %$@#-ed. And I’m %$#%-ing pissed off.

I went to two Starbucks — and I’m calling them out: corner of Tampa and Victory (Tarzana?) and corner of Canoga and Oxnard (Woodland Hills) — both of which have lines at least 10 people long. And no, the lines don’t appear to be moving. They have one cashier, one person making drinks, one shuffling around getting sandwiches. And at Canoga and Oxnard, one stocking the condiment bar. Condiment-bar stocker — get ye to a cash register and start taking care of this backlog.

Which brings me to another point. Are there on-site managers at any of these Starbucks locations? I ask because no one appears to be in charge. The Tampa and Victory location didn’t have any toilet paper in the bathroom — and this is 9:30 in the $#@#-ing morning. 9-#@#$-ing-thirty. Yeah, I used your bathroom facilities, came out, found the line doubled in size and left.

Don’t get me wrong, Starbucks workers — I feel your pain, and I’ll probably be not just in sympathy with you, but one of you myself, quicker than you can say “free pound a week.”

So I’m sorry to bag on you, the Starbucks worker, but at 9:30 a.m. I’d just like a cup of damn coffee and I’m enormously frustrated that it takes a 10-minute wait in line to get it.

I’m no Starbucks manager, but with the amount of cash you’re dragging in on a daily basis, YOU NEED TWO PEOPLE AT THE TWO CASH REGISTERS. This isn’t a worker problem, it’s a management problem.

It’s also an American problem. There’s no law saying another company can’t rise up and provide some damn competition. Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf — you beckon, you call me … you know how to make a line move. There just needs to be more of you, a ubiquitous presence …